Bone grafts are occasionally used in orthopedic surgery. Bone grafts are used to fill gaps between a recipient bone and an implant. Bone autografts have the ability to be osteoinductive, osteogenic, and/or osteoconductive and therefore are an advantageous choice for orthopedic surgery, to interface off-the-shelf implants to bone. Allografts are also commonly used.
For example, in reverse shoulder arthroplasty, the shoulder joint involves implants that replicate the native shoulder joint, but in a reverse arrangement with the scapula forming the joint head, and the humerus forming the socket. Reverse shoulder arthroplasty is often used because of glenoid deformities and/or rotators cuff malfunction. Considering that the humerus must be machined and converted into a socket, there is a source of graft that can be used to correct glenoid deformities, and/or to create an interface between an implant and the glenoid. Humerus bone grafts may be harvested to compensate the bone loss due to glenoid erosion. As subchondral bone has been shown to be effective in stabilizing glenoid implants more than cancellous bone, it is desirable to harvest grafts in the humerus.
However, grafting techniques involving for example autografts commonly involve some graft adaptation steps, e.g., machining, alterations, for the graft to have a desired geometry for subsequent implantation. However, such machining steps may add time to a surgical procedure.